Beware, Diablo IVadventurers, for dark whispers speak of a horrific beast of great power that can spawn ungodly numbers of clones and totally fuck you up. It’s not a lie! I’ve seen it happen to many folks, and not all have returned to tell the tale.
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Diablo IV’s launch has been pretty damn uneventful and smooth, which in 2023 is actually impressive and newsworthy. But no game, especially not a game as fresh out of the oven and massive as Diablo IV, can launch in a perfect state. So of course there are some bugs and other issues in Blizzard’s latest action-RPG. And perhaps the funniest involves an enemy named Darcel who can—and seems to often—spawn dozens and dozens of himself.
In Diablo IV there’s a fairly simple, not-too-exciting side-quest called “Stolen Artifice” in the region of Scosglen. The short side-quest asks you to hunt down a big baddie, kill him, take his runic charm, and bring it back to someone. This is your bog-standard video game fetch quest, of the sort you’ve likely done variations of more times than you can remember at this point. However, there’s currently a bug with “Stolen Artifice” that leads to clones of the quest’s boss—Darcel—spawning almost endlessly, causing problems.
Some players are reporting that Darcel will just spawn forever, causing crashes or making it impossible to finish the quest. Some have had luck defeating Darcel, the neverending monster, by killing the original Darcel before he can spawn far too many copies of himself.
While this bug is pretty damn funny to watch, I can imagine someone playing a hardcore-mode character (which has only one chance at life, and is gone forever upon death) finding this bugged quest and screaming in terror as they realize, far too late, that they are about to get wrecked by a clone army of Darcels. RIP to those poor souls.
A new glitch in Destiny 2’s Season of the Deep makes it easy to farm infinite Legendary Shards through unlimited Exotic drops. It’s super simple and easy and probably won’t be around for long.
A Foe From The Next Team Ninja Game Is Giving Me Sekiro PTSD
I came upon the exploit via theDestiny streamer Leopard, though it’s been spreading like wildfire throughout the community because of how fast and generous it is. Season of the Deep added new class-based Exotic quests for existing gear that’s been reworked over at Ikora Rey in the Tower. One simple trick allows you to take the single Exotic reward and multiply it indefinitely. Here’s how it works:
Go to Ikora and pick one of the Exotic quests.
Get to step four
Go back and speak to her but don’t collect the reward
Instead back out and open your quest log and abandon the quest
Now talk to Ikora again and pick up as many copies of the Exotic as you want
You’ll want to make sure the inventory slot for the relevant armor piece is empty, otherwise space will fill up quickly. But once you get going you can just start deleting all of the extra Exotic pieces and then grab more without ever leaving Ikora’s quest screen. Each broken-down Exotic will net you seven Gunsmith reputation, 500 Glimmer, and five Legendary Shards.
Shards are used for focusing Engrams, buying other resources like upgrade modules, and grabbing new weapons and gear from various vendors. They’re easy to run low on, especially if you’re a new player. And you never know which way the wind is going to turn in Destiny 2’s economy, so it’s always a good time to stock up.
Bungie likes to patch these exploits quickly, however, so who knows how long this one will remain viable. For now it’s nice to have something to fill the Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom duplication glitch-sized hole in my heart after that game’s most recent update.
Update 5/26/2023 7:05 p.m. ET: And it’s already gone. Bummer.
As Bungie continues on its warpath against Destiny 2 cheaters, the studio has won $12 million in the lawsuit against Romanian cheat seller Mihai Claudiu-Florentin that began back in 2021.
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Claudiu-Florentin sold cheat software at VeteranCheats, which allowed users to get an edge over other players with software that could do things like tweak their aim and let them see through walls. Naturally, Bungie argued that the software was damaging to Destiny 2‘s competitive and cooperative modes, and has won the case against the seller. The lawsuit alleges “copyright infringement, violations of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), breach of contract, intentional interference with contractual relations, and violations of the Washington Consumer Protection Act.” (Thanks, TheGamePost).
You can read a full PDF of the suit, courtesy of TheGamePost, here, but the gist of it is that Bungie is asking for $12,059,912.98 in total damages, with $11,696,000 going toward violations of the DMCA, $146,662.28 for violations of the Copyright Act, and $217,250.70 accounting for the studio’s attorney expense. After subpoenaing Stripe, a payment processing service, Bungie learned that at least 5848 separate transactions took place through the service that included Destiny 2 cheating software from November 2020 to July 2022.
While Bungie might have $12 million more dollars out of this, VeteranCheats’ website is still up and offering cheating software for games like Overwatch and Call of Duty. Though, Destiny no longer appears on the site’s home page or if you search within its community.
A console staple Because the Xbox Series S is $30 off, you can put that $30 towards storage, an extra controller, or the Xbox Game Pass Ultimate.
According to the lawsuit, Bungie has paid around $2 million in its anti-cheating efforts between staffing and software. This also extended to a blanket ban on cheating devices in both competitive and PvE modes earlier this month.
While Destiny 2 has been wrapped up in legal issues, the shooter has also been caught up in some other controversy recently thanks to a major leak that led to the ban of a major content creator in the game’s community.
I don’t collect Pokémon cards much myself. I have a select few cards I’ve kept over the years, mostly ones of my favorite monsters or sporting characters I like such as the Professor’s Research card featuring my husband Professor Turo. But I am always captivated by the art The Pokémon Company slaps on a piece of cardstock and throws into a pack with other pieces of cardstock for kids and also Logan Paul to spend untold amounts of money on. That captivation continues because The Pokémon Company is collaborating with Japanese artist Yu Nagaba on a new line of Eeveelution cards, and they’re really cool.
If you’re unfamiliar with Nagaba’s work, he’s known for his minimalistic style that kinda feels evocative of newspaper comics. He’s collaborated with Pokémon before on things like a 2021 Pikachu card and Ed Sheeran’s “Celestial” music video. This new collaboration is a box set featuring art of Eevee and all its evolutions. It will launch in Japan on May 24 and run 4800 yen (roughly $36 USD) . It includes a rubber playmat, sleeves for cards, and a deck box. Right now, the set is part of a lottery on the Japanese Pokémon Center site. On top of the box set, Nagaba’s art also appears on a portfolio and card display frame, which will run 1980 yen (about $15 USD) and 1490 yen (around $11 USD), respectively.
Once May 24 comes around, the Pokémon Center will include a promo card of the Eeveelutions for every 1000 yen spent on a TCG-related purchase. This announcement precedes another announcement that will take place on May 5, revealing more information about a collaboration between Nagaba, Pokémon, and the clothing brand BEAMS. Thanks to PokéBeach for the translations.
Now that I’m looking at all these Eeveelution pieces, I just want to see all my favorites in Nagaba’s style. This is prime minimalist tattoo fodder. Give me Raichu, Nagaba, I’ll get him inked into my arm forever.
Let’s take a look at all the cards and merch Nagaba drew up for the collection.
Welcome to Exp. Share, Kotaku’s weekly Pokémon column in which we dive deep to explore notable characters, urban legends, communities, and just plain weird quirks from throughout the Pokémon franchise. This week, we’re looking at how Spinda, an unassuming critter from Generation III, went from a novelty to an apparent nuisance for The Pokémon Company to work with because of its multiple forms.
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27 years after Pokémon Red and Green, alternate forms and designs in Pokémon have become a mainstay in the series. From Shiny Pokémon to event ‘mons like the spiky-eared Pichu, most Pokémon can look a little bit different from their original versions. However, there is one Pokémon that has more forms than any other one else in the series, and that’s Spinda. Because of how its designed is determined, it can have somewhere around four billion different forms.
Spinda is a normal-type Pokémon introduced in Ruby and Sapphire for the Game Boy Advance. While the swirly-eyed little bear seems mostly unremarkable on the surface, it has a gimmick in its appearance that’s resulted in its own a cult following within the Pokémon community. The character has a spot pattern on its coat that, similar to shiny odds, is entirely determined by background math that can give it up to four billion possible variations. It’s a mainstay of its Pokédex entries across the games, with several saying that no two Spinda have the same spot patterns.
How does Spinda have so many forms?
Spinda’s appearance is determined by its individual personality value, or encryption constant in more recent entries, which is a 32-bit integer ranging from zero to 4,294,967,295. This number is assigned the first time you meet a Pokémon in a save file, and where it lands determines the placement of its spots, as well as other things like gender and nature. On top of this, each of these variations could be Shiny, doubling its variations. This is a neat idea that has helped Spinda stand out among its third-generation contemporaries and has made it a centerpiece in its own Pokémon community.
Because Spinda’s possible forms are so vast, communities such as the Spinda’s Cafe subreddit are dedicated to documenting every variation of its spot pattern. There’s even an in-browser app called Spinda Painter that lets you test different personality values and shiny possibilities to see the resulting spot patterns. While it’s a strictly cosmetic change, it’s the closest Pokémon has ever gotten to replicating how different real-world animal fur patterns can look from one another.
Image: The Pokémon Company / Kotaku
How has this affected Spinda in recent games?
But that variation is why Spinda has been an issue for Game Freak and The Pokémon Company in terms of transferring the character and all its variants to future games. Pokémon Home, the app players use to transfer and store Pokémon between games, can’t transfer Spinda to and from Pokémon Go or Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl remakes because they’re inconsistent with how other games determine the character’s spot pattern. Pokémon Go only has nine predetermined patterns rather than the several billion found in most games, and the Diamond and Pearl remakes have a glitch associated with how it reads the numbers that determine Spinda’s forms. This means that the value these games assign to Spinda could result in a completely different spot pattern being assigned to the same Pokémon. As a result, Spinda is the only Pokémon obtainable in Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl that can’t be transferred to and from these games.
While it’s unclear if these billions of possible designs are responsible, Spinda has notably not been obtainable in a new game since Game Freak retired the National Dex that allows players to transfer any and all old Pokémon to new games. Spinda was conspicuously absent from Sword and Shield and Scarlet and Violet. Given that The Pokémon Company is running into compatibility issues with Spinda on several fronts, it will be interesting to see if Spinda appears in a mainline Pokémon game ever again. But even if the dizzy bear doesn’t show up in a new Pokémon game any time soon, at least there are corners of the Pokémon fandom that are taking steps to ensure what makes it special isn’t forgotten.
Diablo IV is still a couple of months away, but Blizzard is already stomping down some of the game’s most popular classes ahead of its June 6 release date. The studio posted a new blog on its website reflecting on the game’s recent beta, and shared what’s basically a full set of patch notes it will implement ahead of Diablo IV’s launch. While there aren’t a lot of hard numbers to go off of, you can at least get a sense of where some of the game’s character classes will be by the time fans get to play them again.
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What is Blizzard doing to my precious baby angel Necromancer?
At the end of March, Blizzard said Necromancers and Sorcerers were the most popular classes among beta players. This was especially significant for Necromancer, as the class was only available during one of the game’s two test periods, while the Sorcerer was available for both. Kotaku’s own Levi Winslow used Necromancer most, and said the class was “truly busted” thanks to its ability to revive dead skeletons to fight alongside them. While Blizzard’s new blog says these dead minions will die more often, there are no specific numbers or any mention of a smaller skeletal headcount being forced upon players. The developer notes the dead’s increased vulnerability will make raising them “a more active component” in playing the Necromancer, rather than something you can just set and forget.
The Sorcerer’s debuffs seem less all-encompassing, with Chain Lightning dealing less damage and specifically reduced effectiveness against boss characters. But beyond that, the class is getting some buffs with abilities like Charged Bolt and an increased Lucky Hit chance for Meteor Skill’s Enchantment bonus.
While players will be getting some changes in the final game, some enemies will, as well. The Butcher, an enemy who gave some players a tough time during the beta, may be getting some kind of rework before the game launches. The blog states that the team has “re-evaluated” the enemy for difficulty, and it will “present a greater challenge in World Tiers III and IV.” So it sounds like it might become easier on lower difficulties, but even harder on higher ones.
What’s happening in the Diablo IV pre-release patch notes?
Beyond balance changes, Blizzard is also tweaking Diablo IV’s dungeon layouts to avoid backtracking, which it says was a common complaint during the betas. Here is the full list of patch notes for those curious:
Dungeon Layouts
One of the most common pieces of feedback Blizzard received is that players felt they were doing a lot of backtracking within certain dungeons. The team has optimized multiple dungeons across all zones to minimize the need for backtracking. Here is a list of dungeons specifically in the Fractured Peaks zone which received layout updates:
Caldera Gate
Defiled Catacombs
Derelict Lodge
Forbidden City
Hoarfrost Demise
Immortal Emanation
Kor Dragan Barracks
Maulwood
Rimescar Caverns
Developer’s Note: Our primary goal with the Layout changes was to reduce certain kinds of backtracking which detract from a player’s experience. An example of this change is that players previously needed to enter side rooms to interact with Structure Objectives, causing them to retread the same path. Now, many of our Structure Objectives have been repositioned along main dungeon pathways, making them easier for players to reach and allowing them to readily explore the dungeon after defeating the Structure.
Dungeon Events
The chance for an Event to spawn inside of a dungeon has increased from 10% to 60%.
Dungeon Gameplay
To reduce the need to backtrack, small numbers of straggling monsters will seek out the player to help complete the Kill All Monsters objective.
When Animus is gathered, the player and nearby allies will:
Gain 10 Resource.
Reduce all active Cooldowns by 1 second.
Depositing Animus channel time was reduced from 3 to 0 seconds.
The time to Rescue was reduced from 3 to 1.5 seconds.
All Rescue objectives now drop a Health Potion upon completion.
While carrying the Ancient’s Statue, Bloodstone, Mechanical Box, or Stone Carving, you will receive a Momentum bonus granting a 25% move speed increase to you and nearby allies.
Pedestals have had their channel time reduced from 2 to 0 seconds.
Returning a Portable Object to its Pedestal now fully restores Health, Resource, Potions, and resets cooldowns for all nearby players.
All doors will now generate a minimap ping when they are opened.
All Structure Objectives in dungeons now have additional combat mechanics players must overcome.
Developer’s Note: While our dungeons offer a variety of Objectives to complete, player feedback stated that the action of completing each Objective felt tedious. We hope that providing bonuses, such as the increase to mobility while carrying certain Objective items, will streamline and vary the experience of completing Objectives. This adjustment is merely a starting point, and we intend to extend this philosophy to keys in a future update.
General
Effects like Stun and Freeze can be applied to Elite Monsters twice as long before they become Unstoppable.
Reviewed class skills to confirm that all classes have access to sufficient skills that remove control impairing effects.
Many Legendary Powers have had updates to their effectiveness.
Barbarian
A flat 10% passive damage reduction has been added for the Barbarian Class. Some Skill Tree passives had their damage reduction effects reduced to compensate.
The Whirlwind Skill now deals more damage and consumes more Fury.
The Double Swing Skill Enhancement refunds its full Fury cost when used on Stunned or Knocked Down enemies.
Druid
Companion Skills will now deal heavily increased damage.
All Ultimate Skills have had their cooldowns reduced.
Usability improvements have been made to Maul and Pulverize.
Using a non-Shapeshifting Skill will transform a Druid back into their human form.
Necromancer
Summoned Minions will die more often, requiring players to utilize Corpses more often.
Many bonuses in the Book of the Dead have had their stats increased.
The damage dealt by the Corpse Explosion skill has been reduced.
The brightness of the Skeletal Warriors and Mages has been reduced.
Rogue
Upgrades for Subterfuge Skills have had their bonuses increased.
Multiple passive Skills have had their bonuses increased.
All Imbuement Skills have had their cooldowns increased.
Sorcerer
Charged Bolt’s damage was increased and the Mana cost to cast has decreased.
Decreased the damage of Chain Lightning and reduced its effectiveness against Bosses.
Decreased the cooldown for the Incinerate Skill’s Enchantment bonus.
Firewalls will now spawn underneath enemies more frequently when using its Enchantment bonus.
Increased the Lucky Hit chance for the Meteor Skill’s Enchantment bonus.
Developer’s Note: Whenever we introduce changes to our Classes, it is with the goal of making both them and their Skills feel impactful and powerful—your feedback has helped us uphold this ideal. Some players have adeptly noticed that certain Skills were too powerful. One of our goals for Skills is to have them be interesting to wield and interactive in terms of itemization and combat feel. We’ve made some changes to help in this regard, with one example being the Necromancer’s Minions. We’ve made a change that makes them more vulnerable in combat, which will make raising the dead a more active component of the Necromancer’s gameplay. Launch is just the first step of our Class balance journey, and you can expect further updates that iterate on this pillar of Diablo IV.
UI
Fixed an issue where the built-in Screen Reader was not reading key prompts, game options details, and other UI text.
Fixed an issue where actions could not be bound to the mouse wheel.
Fixed an issue where Evade couldn’t be bound to the right Analog Stick on controller.
Chat will now display on the left side of the screen when using the centered action bar configuration.
A character’s stats will be displayed by default when players click the Materials & Stats button within their Inventory.
The Move and Interact inputs can now be mapped to one button while the Primary Attack input is mapped to a secondary button.
The sans serif font used in-game has been replaced with a new serif font.
Encounters
Fixed multiple issues that allowed bosses, like the Butcher, to become unresponsive.
The Butcher has been re-evaluated for difficulty and will present a greater challenge in World Tiers III and IV.
Bosses such as T’chort, Malnok, Vhenard, and others were reevaluated for melee character difficulty, resulting in changes to attacks and fight mechanics.
Fixed an issue where Vampire Brutes using the Shadow Enchant affix would chain-cast Impale.
Cellars
Increased the chance for a dungeon Event to occur in Cellars.
Cellars will now consistently reward a chest upon completion.
Fixed an issue where Cellars would prematurely be marked as complete.
Fixed an issue where the guaranteed elite monster would be absent from a Cellar.
General quality of life
Fixed an issue where players could increase attack speed by move-cancelling attacks early.
Fixed an issue where characters weren’t immune and untargetable after loading into an area.
The Reset Dungeon button has been disabled.
Fixed an issue that caused Gale Valley and Serac Rapture to have less monsters than intended until the campaign quests in those territories were completed.
Bungie is cracking down on Destiny 2 players using third-party peripherals to cheat in the game’s competitive and cooperative modes.
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The studio is following Call of Duty: Warzone’s example, which implemented a similar ban at the beginning of April, and is now monitoring when players use devices to get the leg up against others. Bungie outlines its policy in a blog post on its website, but stops short of naming any specific software or hardware because it “simply [doesn’t] want to offer a bigger spotlight than necessary.” But broadly, the post lists things like “programmable controllers, keyboard and mouse adapters, advanced macros, or automation via artificial intelligence” meant to let the user use inputs in a way that goes beyond what the game or player is typically capable of.
Bungie makes a distinction between things like external accessibility aids that make the game playable as intended for people with disabilities and third-party peripherals maliciously designed to give the user an advantage over others. Because Destiny 2’s PvE content also affects things like races to finish the game’s raids at launch, Bungie is extending these rules to cooperative modes, as well.
“Simply using an accessibility aide to play Destiny 2, where a player could not play otherwise, would not be a violation of this policy,” the post reads. “Using these tools to mitigate challenges all players face, such as reducing recoil or increasing aim assist, would be a violation.”
Moving forward, Bungie says it will be monitoring for violations, with plans to issue warnings, restrictions, or outright bans depending on the situation. Cheating in online games is as old as the medium, but what that means and how it’s detectable varies from game to game. Valve recently caught and banned over 40,000 cheaters from Dota 2and then publicized the move as a threat to would-be cheaters.
While third-party software and peripherals are one part of the conversation, some competitive communities are deciding for themselves what cheating looks like. The Super Smash Bros. Ultimate competitive scene has been dealing with an in-game strategy that was deemed unfair involving the character Steve. Since then, some tournament organizers have made the decision to ban the character outright, rather than having to vet suspect players at events.
Red, Green, and Blue are the bestsellingPokémon games of all time, and as the games that first launched the franchise on Game Boy in Japan way back in 1996, they’re old enough that I was convinced I’d seen every form of homage and fan media dedicated to Pokémon’s humble beginnings. I was wrong. I recently discovered War/Crimes, a fan comic that features the Kanto gym leaders Lt. Surge and Team Rocket boss Giovanni, whose relationship in the comic feels too nuanced to be easily summed up as “on-off boyfriends.” Despite the provocative cover and the characters being “sexy violent [and] gay” throughout, it’s the comic’s exploration of Kanto’s military-industrial complex that will stay in the back of my brain forever.
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Lieutenant Surge has always been a strange presence in the Pokémon games. Prior to 2010’s Black and White, the Fame Checker (an item which offers up descriptions of important people) called Surge “The Lightning American.” He likes electric Pokémon, we were told,because they “saved” him during “the war.” He flew an electrical plane as a pilot, which means that he likely fought in World War II. Or whatever the equivalent is in the Pokémon universe.
The developers could have just left Surge in as a quirky reference to a war that ended Japan’s imperial capabilities. But the lore goes deeper. He had a cautious nature in the army, set up his own electric traps, and uses double locks everywhere. It’s not the behavior of a man who left the army with his psyche entirely intact. Comic artist and animation director Kelly Turnbull took this premise and went wild with it.
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Image: Kelly Turnbull
As War/Crimes tells it, Surge and Giovanni were comrades-in-arms during the war, and they’ve both got their baggage about how disposable their lives were. Surge is now relatively poor, and he’s struggling to define himself beyond his post-traumatic stress disorder. Giovanni joined the army to fund his Pokémon League challenge,but after watching his Nidoking get ripped apart in front of him, he grew angry towards the war machine. War/Crimes doesn’t spend any time wondering whether or not the war was justified, or whether or not their losses were noble sacrifices. It’s more interested in how economic violence can cause even more suffering in the world.
See, it wasn’t just Giovanni’s ambition that created Team Rocket here. It was the money-hungry Pokémon League, which is more concerned about profit than helping children rise above their station. The comic explains that the Cerulean Gym secured the designation of being water specialists from the League by relying on “underage” girls to sway officials, all while the more deserving Vermillion City, which actually has a coastline, went overlooked. And Surge does not become a gym leader because of his leadership abilities or military strength; it was a new life, loaned to him by the boss of Team Rocket. War/Crimes isn’t just showing us a queer reading of the Game Boy games, but one viewed through an anti-capitalist lens.
Before you ask: Yes, the two veterans are unambiguously gay, good news for those who think subtext is for cowards. They have sexual contact with one another, though they call each other “friends” throughout the comic. I liked that a lot. Their relationship in the comic feels comfortable, intimate, and familiar even when they don’t directly address it or what it is. The army officer and the leader of Team Rocket don’t need to adhere to pageantry. But it could be self-protective masculinity too. These two men have been eviscerated by the war machine, and they think that they have no more blood to give, nothing left to be ashamed of. But the scary thing about the modern world is that it always finds a way.
There’s one line that sticks in my brain several days after reading. “What happened to us?” Surge asks after a nightmare causes him to punch Giovanni in his sleep. But the mob boss doesn’t get angry, doesn’t push him away. “Other people,” he replied. Even if these men have wonderful chemistry with each other, even if they work towards being vulnerable, the world can be a terrible place that makes love and loving hard, even as it remains the only thing that can save them. This is not the same Pokémon world that I know, but it compels me to imagine the implications of Kanto having a military-industrial complex that funnels poor men like Giovanni into institutions that try to kill them.
It’s never too late to start reading comics about old gay men. The comic is worth sampling if you’re interested in alternate interpretations of Pokémon history. Turnbull plans to post one page for free every day. If you can’t wait for the entire thing, you can also purchase it on itch.io for a dollar.
Because Final Fantasy XIV has somehow evolved into one of the biggest video games on the planet, Square Enix has decided to grab some of its older content out of the back of the fridge, reheat it in the microwave for a bit and serve it up to a whole new audience of players who probably weren’t around when it was first released.
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I’m talking specifically here about the game’s second major expansion, Stormblood, which was released six years ago as a premium piece of downloadable content, but which for the next few weeks will be made available for free (provided you’ve already got a paid subscription, they’re not just giving it away to free/trial players).
As the game’s site points out (thanks, Eurogamer), the free offer runs until May 28. Importantly it’s not free-to-play, it’s free-to-download, so provided you grab it before that deadline you’ll be able to play it whenever you want.
It’s good for both the console and PC versions of the game, though as this official FAQ points out, you need to make double sure on PC that you’re downloading the correct edition, as only the Steam download will work if you bought the game on Steam, etc.
Incredible visuals This smart TV has access to a wide array of streaming services, all of which are easier to navigate, has 4K visuals for a stunning picture, and comes with an Alexa Voice Remote too.
Final Fantasy XIV is one of the best massively multiplayer online role-playing games going, one of the few able to maintain a monthly subscription model in a day when even an Elder Scrolls MMO has to go free-to-play. Stormblood’s epic narrative, gorgeous new locales, spectacular battles and some fresh gameplay mechanics make a great game even better.
I am never going to finish it and no one can make me.
Destiny 2 has gotten a bunch of hotfixes since the Lightfall expansion launched several weeks ago, but none like yesterday’s update. A fix not mentioned in the patch notes secretly changed the game’s newest Warlock armband armor to make it look less like a vagina.
Bond of Detestation is a class item that drops from Destiny 2‘s new Root of Nightmares raid that went live on March 10 and focuses on Nezarec, an old disciple of the game’s arch antagonist, The Witness. Up until Thursday it could have been mistaken for an alien fleshlight, mostly because of a small horizontal slit across the front of it.
It sort of looks like an eyeball, maybe, not really. Its resemblance to a vulva was especially noticeable when certain shaders were applied. Players suggested all sorts of names for it–Witnussy, Nezussy, Nezzylight–but “Bondussy” was the one that stuck.
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As first reported by Forbes’ Paul Tassi, Bungie has now stepped in to take the horny down a notch. This week’s hotfix addressed a number of bugs. The biggest change from the patch notes was a fix for the infamous Thresher gunships that had been murdering players throughout the solar system. Completely unmentioned was the fact that the hotfix also removed the Bondussy’s slit to make it look much less suggestive. It’s sort of now just a giant space pearl.
Stealth content changes and visual adjustments like this are rare, in part because the Destiny 2 community is hyper sensitive to every little shift in its sci-fi universe. Bungie removed a piece of armor back in 2017 because it had an alt-right symbol on it with Nazi origins. Bondussy wasn’t hate speech, though it clearly must have run afoul of Bungie’s broader artistic intentions for the raid armor. Or maybe the studio just didn’t like the nickname “Bondussy.”
Lance Reddick, the actor who’s been lending his voice to games ranging from the Horizon series to Quantum Break, passed away Friday. He was 60 years old. While he’s been in films and TV shows such as John Wick and The Wire, Destiny players know him best as the commander of The Last City, the Awoken Guardian Zavala. Now, folks who’ve heard the news of Reddick’s death are flocking to his in-game character to honor him as their forever commander in a wholesome display of gamer solidarity.
Zavala is a mainstay in the Destiny universe. One of the first characters you meet after waking up in the original game and blasting your way through an alien-infested planet, Zavala could be found in the Tower’s war room alongside Cayde-6 and Ikora Rey. A kind of stoic blank slate in the beginning, he would primarily sling a variety of Titan armor in silence. However, he’s been given a lot of emotional backstory in the years since, with the character evolving in significant ways—he’s more talkative when you see him in the Tower now, standing alone and looking out at the Traveler, pontificating on the state of the world and his role in it in Reddick’s dulcet tones.
In last year’s Witch Queen expansion, he grappled with his faith as cosmic forces challenged it, which gave Reddick even more room to flex into Zavala’s character and personality. Subsequent seasons revealed a familiar tragedy from his past that still haunted him. Infamous lines memed into oblivion like, “We’ve stepped into a war with the Cabal on Mars,” also gave way to intimate personal tales of grief and struggle.
So, with the news that Reddick has suddenly passed away due to what police are saying is natural causes, many Guardians are now paying their respects to the beloved Titan Commander, heading to the Tower to pay tribute to him as best they can. Games journalist Saniya Ahmed shared a picture of gatherers at the Tower, writing that some players were giving each other emote hugs.
Kotaku senior editor Alyssa Mercante jumped into the game and confirmed there were folks gathered around Zavala. Several players deployed the Peaceful Rest emote, which surrounds them in neon-colored tower candles. Another held a shield and sword made of light. A few just sat.
Folks are heartbroken over this loss, including many Bungie employees, who shared their immediate reactions to the shocking news on Twitter. Artwork of Zavala has already been drawn up and sent out. Content creator Uhmaayyze shared an older image of Reddick holding a Destiny gun, beaming. Zavala quotes are circulating online, their meaning holding even more weight in light of this loss. Some players are even planning a “community-wide silent sit-down event” in front of Zavala to pay tribute to Reddick’s stellar performance, while others are trying to organize a shared color scheme to honor him. Reddick’s impact on the Destiny community cannot be understated, especially since the last tweet he liked was about the game.
It’s never a good feeling when a beloved figure passes, especially someone as influential and prolific as Lance Reddick. But thanks to the community’s adoration and his immortalization across mediums, Reddick will live on forever. So, eyes up, Guardians, Commander Zavala is forever watching over you.
There was a lot of hype going into Lightfall, Destiny 2‘s big cyberpunk expansion. The reality has been much more muted, full of ups and downs, fun discoveries and tedious chores. Live-service games are unwieldy creatures to try and examine under a microscope, and Destiny remains one of the toughest of them all.
Free-to-play sandbox changes are launching alongside the paid campaign, and separate seasonal story missions will be dropping week to week as hotfixes continue rolling out. Below fellow Kotaku writer and Destiny 2 glutton Zack Zwiezen and I discuss the highs and lows of Lightfall’s initial kick-off.
Zack Zwiezen: Eyes up, Guardians. We will be talking about Destiny.
Ethan Gach: Okay, let’s start with the Lightfall campaign. What were your most and least favorite parts? The high point for me was obviously the opening cinematic that shows The Traveler confronting The Witness and everything going sideways. The low point was crawling through air ducts while Osiris barked at me to quit wasting time and become one with the green space magic (Strand).
Zack: My favorite part was also the opening bit and the ending. It felt like stuff was happening and actually seeing the Traveler do something was amazing. Finally, the orb is helping us. My least-favorite part was how much the rest of the main campaign feels like season three of Lost, just spinning its wheels until the big finale.
It’s ironic that Osiris is so angry about us wasting time when this whole campaign feels like a waste of time.
Ethan: I felt extremely torn throughout most of it between the gravity of the story Bungie is telling at this moment and the lightheartedness of the ‘80s tropes littered throughout the campaign.
Neomuna feels like a cross between a Saturday morning cartoon and an afternoon at a futuristic space mall. The training montage with Strand was cute but also felt like a complete waste of time. Nimbus has grown on me over time, but I think they suffer from being the loan representative of an entire new civilization.
Zack: I kept wondering, as I played through the campaign, what the point of this expansion was. And the weird mix, as you mention, of ‘80s tropes and serious storytelling, didn’t help. With Witch Queen, I really liked how the narrative developed the idea that the Light isn’t some inherently good thing. That it can instead be used by anyone and how that really shook up Zavala and others. This time around the Strand was just a fun Darkness power we got via a Rocky-like montage, beat Calus (again) and I was left going “Okay…cool?”
I really enjoy exploring Neomuna and Nimbus has also grown on me. And I do like how the post-campaign quests seem to be expanding more on the lore of the planet and its people. But compared to last year and Witch Queen, I mostly felt disappointed by Lightfall.
Even the Vanguard have no idea what the hell is going on.Image: Bungie
Ethan: Yes, Witch Queen felt like a very tightly calibrated story with a beginning, middle, and end that built out the lore and stakes of the larger story while still focusing mostly on expanding on Savathûn’s backstory and motivations. No characters really provided that in Lightfall.
The end-game quests are much stronger than many of the campaign missions, I think, and probably would have provided a nice middle point to help the expansion breathe a bit more. I think backloading finally getting Strand, learning about Neomuna’s history, and also what Rohan was up to prior to our arrival, only served to make the campaign feel even more rushed and underexplained.
Zack: Yup. And I’ll also admit now that I still don’t fully understand why The Witness couldn’t just pop down to Neomuna and get his fancy Veil thing and do what he needed to do. And I also found it weird that Bungie—which is usually good about seeding stuff long before it becomes a big part of the story—just invented this whole Veil thing outta nowhere.
It just added to the feeling that this was rushed or not planned out as well as past expansions and seasons. Ethan, where did The Witness go? And will we find out before the next expansion via the upcoming seasons?
Ethan: I’m sure there will be hints of it throughout the upcoming seasons. But as tends to be the case with the expansion/season divide, my guess is the plot won’t move forward until The Final Shape. Which is fine, honestly. I get why some people felt like Lightfall needed to deliver more than a couple cutscenes, but I would have been completely satisfied if it felt like Neomuna had been properly fleshed out and had more tension.
I do think it’s been much more successful as a patrol space and launching pad for new exotic missions, however. What have you been thinking of the post-game and the broader content changes and additions in Lightfall?
Terminal Overload is a great public activity, if you can find enough players to help out. Image: Bungie
Zack: I like the quality-of-life stuff! The loadout manager is cool and actually works. The way red frame weapons work now, where you just get the plan right away, is nice. But it’s not all great. I hate the new guardian rank system. And the commendation stuff, which could have been cool, just sucks.
Commendations seem so generic and everyone is giving them out all the time, regardless of how I played, and it all feels pointless at the moment.
Ethan: Yea it feels very caught between wanting to incentivize good behavior and also not lead to negativity. Also since matchmaking is reserved for the easiest activities, I’m also rarely ever paying attention to who I’m playing with.
By the end of a Defiant Battleground or Nightfall I rarely remember who was the person that went out of their way to revive me or kept us from wiping. I do see who is the best dressed, and yet there’s no style commendation. It also feels moot when you can assign one to both people, and a chore considering the number of button presses. How do you feel about the overhauled mods?
Zack: All of the mod changes are solid and much needed, I feel. The mod manager helps a lot too. I really like how much easier it is to play how I want without having to worry about costs or energy types as much. I also like that the artifact mods are now active perks. Overall I now enjoy messing with mods and my build more than before. And I was someone who barely cared about that stuff before because it was such a chore.
Ethan: It definitely feels like the builds have less personality around them. Warmind mods had a very specific flavor, and I miss elemental wells a ton. Overall I think the changes are good to great on average, though I think the way mod benefits are communicated is still a little obtuse, especially for newcomers.
It’s clearly part of the design philosophy at Bungie to slap “+10% kinetic damage” on something, which I admire, but the current system requires learning a lot of keywords to break down what are, at the end of the day, numerical trade-offs. Speaking of which, man it’s rough out there for legendary primaries.
Calus is the Sol System’s favorite lush, but his character arc is more than played out. Image: Bungie
Zack: I’m still mostly using stuff from the last two seasons, which is often a bad sign. I’ve not liked most of the new Neomuna-themed legendary weapons. Which feels like a change from past seasons, where I would often end up swapping out most of my stuff for the new toys and having a good time!
Ethan: The Neomuna weapons haven’t been super exciting, and it’s a pain that the Terminal Overload ones aren’t craftable. I’d almost rather have it be reversed, with Nimbus’ engram weapons being RNG rolls only, since Terminal Overload is a much more targeted farm.
If the Queensguard weapons didn’t also roll out alongside it, I think there would be a lot more talk of Lightfall lacking loot on par with some of the criticisms of Beyond Light, though the exotics are head and shoulders above other expansions (with the exception of Witch Queen’s Osteo Striga, which remains undefeated).
One complaint I have is that I’m over 30 hours into the new content and still don’t have a new crafted weapon yet, with the exception of the Vexcalibur exotic. As with Strand, the campaign would have been a great time to level one of the new guns up and grow attached to it. Now, I almost don’t care anymore. Crafting in general, while less painful, still feels under-developed. It was the key feature of last year’s expansion, and it feels like a footnote now.
Zack: *Looks off into the distance, dreaming of Osteo Striga. What a gun…*
But yeah without the Queensguard weapons I’d be pretty damn bummed about the loot this time around. And about crafted weapons, I too lack any still. And I often forget about the whole system now that I just hit a button to get the plans. It really feels like a misfire, and keeping it around in this current half-baked form feels bad. Rip it out and just let us have generic plans that can be used to craft stuff, or something.
I do think it’s maybe telling that we’ve talked so much about the new expansion and neither of us seems excited about Strand. I don’t hate Strand or anything like that. I enjoy using it. But it’s not as exciting to me as the other subclasses after the big 3.0 overhauls.
New Exotics are the highlight of Lightfall. Image: Bungie
Ethan: It’s definitely very powerful, and I like that it can be utilized very effectively in both offensive and defensive ways, sometimes even in the same build. The grappling hook, like every moment-to-moment action in Destiny 2, feels great. Sorry though, not trading away my grenade for it. I mostly find myself using it now when I want to speed through lower-level grinds. I also don’t find it quite as visually and auditorily satisfying as Stasis, which, as evidenced by the stellar Verglas Curve exotic bow, remains so satisfying every time. But the damage output on Strand is wild. Players bemoaned the boring-sounding Titan Strand subclass, but I think it turned out to be the most fun version of it.
Zack: Oh the grappling hook feels soooooo good. But yeah, giving up a grenade for it and the long cooldown compared to the campaign makes it far less enticing to use regularly.
I think your comment about it not being as visually or auditorily satisfying is accurate and it leads me to the other problem with it: It just doesn’t seem as unique. The other subclasses being mostly elemental worked well to make them stand out. Strand is the first new subclass that seems less obvious to explain to someone. It’s like green space strings…I guess?
Are you excited about the rest of the year? Or has Lightfall dampened your Destiny 2 excitement for 2023? I’ll admit that I came into this new expansion and year very excited and pumped after Witch Queen and the last two seasons. And this has definitely made me a bit less excited for the rest of the year.
Neomuna is full of beauty that never gets its due. Image: Bungie
Ethan: I was extremely burnt out after last fall, and didn’t play a ton of last season. So far, I’ve actually been playing more of Lightfall than Witch Queen, which I loved it, but which I ended up dropping off pretty hard. We haven’t mentioned the Root of Nightmares raid yet, but I think while not as spectacle-driven as some past ones, it will get a lot more play because of how much shorter and more straightforward it is to grind. That’s especially surprising considering how the more general ramp-up in difficulty this season has completely turned me off of doing Lost Sectors and Nightfalls, which just feel like more trouble than they’re worth right now.
Zack: Yeah it’s interesting to see the raid be so much simpler than past raids. I wonder if Bungie wants more people playing raids or is just trying to shake things up and not always do some complicated beast for each new raid. Yet, meanwhile, other parts of the game are harder than ever. I imagine Bungie has data to back up these choices, but then again, as I write this, I see the hotfix patch notes for the game mention increasing rewards on solo Lost Sector runs. So maybe this is more evidence that this expansion and update didn’t get as much time in the oven as it needed
Ethan: As we look forward to the rest of the year—and to be clear, a Destiny expansion really is a year-long $100 commitment at this point (both for Bungie and the player)—there are definitely some things coming that I wish could have arrived alongside Lightfall. An in-game looking-for-group tool is one of the big ones, but the biggest of all is an end to the Power grind. It’s tedious. It gates content. And it’s just not fun.
RPG leveling has always been an uncomfortable fit for Destiny, which is a shooter at heart and fundamentally about chasing guns. Without skill trees or stats to pour points into, there’s really no reason, besides padding. to have to hit an arbitrary number before being able to participate in new content. It’s always been a fundamental tension in Destiny, but I don’t think any of the solutions have ever fixed it. And on a more optimistic note, I’m more confident than ever that the fundamentals of the game are strong enough to survive without it.
Pick an Engram, any Engram.Image: Bungie
Zack: More so than ever, this expansion and season I feel the Power grind and I’m excited to hear Bungie isn’t going to raise it again next season. It feels like the beginning of fully removing it completely. The game can live on without it.
Reading back through this chat, I worry I sound super down on Destiny 2. But I’m still ready for the rest of the year and I’m excited to play more. I think, for me, this expansion just reminded me of how damn good Witch Queen was. It was always going to be hard to compete with that.
Ethan:Lightfall is definitely a slow burn. I can’t recommend it to people who aren’t already invested in the game in some way, unlike The Witch Queen,which was arguably the best shooter campaign of 2022.
But I think, or at least I’m hopeful, that it will bear more fruit over the long run. Season of Defiance is already off to a really strong start compared to other expansion-adjacent seasons, quality of life is improving, a lot of the currencies and grinding is getting streamlined, and there’s room to tie up a lot of interesting loose ends before The Final Shape.
Zack: Agreed. The future is still bright for Destiny 2. We just have to get there.
While Japanese games of varying genres are enjoying success these days, the 2000s and 2010s weren’t as kind, especially in Western markets. Since then, there’s been a lot of speculation as to why Japanese games struggled during these years, often from westerners themselves, with some pointing to key game design trends. But recent comments from Final Fantasy’s creator Hironobu Sakaguchi suggest that the decline of unique console hardware, exclusives, and cultural differences is the likely cause.
By the late 1990s, Japanese games like Final Fantasy VII, Chrono Trigger, or Castlevania had become must-play experiences for their inspired stories, excellent technical presentation, and engaging gameplay. But the following two decades were a different story. Anticipated entries like Final Fantasy XIII failed to reach sales expectations with the rise of Western RPGs such as TK (and many felt that train came off the rails starting with 2001’s Final Fantasy X). Newer attempts at franchises like Sakaguchi’s Blue Dragon on Xbox 360 in 2006 were met with lukewarm reception at best. Meanwhile, Western-made games like Mass Effect had become the new gaming sensations. While some may point to declining interests in traditional, linear forms of storytelling in games as a likely reason, Hironobu Sakaguchi suspects that dramatic changes in the hardware used to play games presented a tough road for Japanese devs to follow.
Sakaguchi: ‘Consoles like the NES and PlayStation were very specific hardware’
Speaking to IGN along with Castlevania senior producer Koji Igarashi, Sakaguchi discussed why he feels Japanese games were of “higher quality” for systems with ‘“specific hardware”’ like the NES or PSX. The answer, as many students of video game history might suspect, has to do with those very consoles. With specific hardware configurations produced by Japanese manufacturers, devs at the time had to become experts in how to best utilize these devices, and there was no language barrier to gaining these skill sets. Sakaguchi said:
“[Specific, Japanese-made consoles] made it easier for Japanese developers to master the hardware, as we could ask Nintendo or Sony directly in Japanese. This is why—I realize it might be impolite to say this—Japanese games were of a higher quality at the time. As a result, Japanese games were regarded as more fun, but when the hardware became easier to develop for, things quickly changed.”
Castlevania producer Koji Igarashi added that the “long history of PC culture” in the West was better adapted to the hardware trends that would follow in the 2000s, a trend which continues to this day. The PS5 and Xbox Series consoles more closely match PC hardware than dedicated gaming boxes perhaps ever have. That change wasn’t easy.
Igarashi describes the journey as a tough growing pain. “Japanese developers could no longer rely on their speciality as console developers,” he said, “and had to master PC development.”
While some may be quick to point out, perhaps, that the PS3’s unique and troublesomeCell Broadband Engine certainly fits the criteria of “specific hardware,” it was maybe too specific. Though Sony made incredible promises for its performance (and odd commercials), its unique architecture was a chore for developers around the world, leading Sony to pivot away from it for the PS4. But the 2000s and 2010s were also a time where Japanese games, particularly Final Fantasy, made the switch to multi-platform releases. Devil May Cry 4 was another notable series that made the jump to other platforms. This shattered the trend of focusing on a specific set of hardware constraints. And at the time it didn’t really go over too well. It seems natural now to expect a Final Fantasy to appear on multiple consoles, but the announcement of XIII coming to Xbox 360 was quite the surprise in the 2000s.
Sakaguchi believes that where we play our games also makes a difference
Sakaguchi also said that the “cultural differences” between Japan and the West make meaningful differences in what kinds of games are made. “In the West,” Sakaguchi said, “children often get their own room from a very young age, whilst in Japan the whole family sleeps together in the same room.” He continued, “such small cultural differences can be felt through the games we make today […] I believe that cherishing my Japanese cultural background is what attracts people towards my games in the first place.”
While I for one can say that my private bedroom probably enhanced my experience of Final Fantasy VII, Sakaguchi’s comments concerning focused mastery of specific hardware likely explained why such epic experiences often felt so unique to the platforms I was playing them on. Or maybe that’s just the nostalgia talking.
In 2023, Pokémon is part of the fabric of our lives. It exists all around us, has for decades, and even if you’re not a fan you will at least know the basic premise.
They’re Pokémon! You catch em all! They fight, they faint, they go in a little ball, there are some kids, some of them (the Pokémon, not the kids) look like dinosaurs, some of them look like animals. You would know that much just be being alive in the 21st century, as you would have been exposed to the series, repeatedly, everywhere from the movie theatre to the supermarket to the clothes section of a department store.
Which is why it’s sometimes extremely fun to look back to the times we didn’t all know about Pokémon, and there are few examples better to illustrate this period of human history than this commercial (uploaded by Dinosaur Dracula, who found it on an old VHS), made for the US market in 1999 for the Pokémon trading card game’s launch in the market (the first video games, meanwhile, had only just been released in the US in late 1998):
How the hell are we going to market this to American kids?, you can hear the suits asking across a 90s boardroom table, before someone raises a hand and tentatively says like sports, they know sports, and everyone else cheers and slaps each other on the back and says you just bought yourself a raise, Thompson.
It’s not the worst idea! To its credit the commercial has aged extremely well, helped by the fact Pokémon still has an incredibly active tournament scene, and at no point is it ever embarrassed or afraid to embrace what it is. OK, maybe the “You got game” part has not aged well, but everything else has.
Milan Fashion Week has just wrapped up, and while this is not normally the kind of thing we would be covering on this, a website about anime, reality television and comic books, 2023’s show featured a surprise inclusion: Blizzard’s Diablo series.
Danish label Han Kjøbenhavn had a whole damn line inspired by (and officially licensed by) Diablo, with founder Jannik Wikkelsø Davidsen—who tells NME he played the game “back in the day”—showing off three separate outfits, two of which you can see in this post.
For those about to say in a comic-book-guy voice “nyyahhhh these don’t look like Diablo characters”, or “I will not be wearing these to my local GameStop, thank you”, please know that this is Milan Fashion Week. This is runway shit. This is designers going wild, art in motion, stuff designed for you to look at and feel something, not wonder when you’ll be able to order it on Amazon or get it with the collector’s edition of a game.
Watch the show, play the game If you’re intrigued by the new show starring Pedro Pascal as Joel and Bella Ramsey as Ellie, consider picking up the source. The 2013 survival horror game recently got a full-on remake for the PS5 with The Last of Us Part 1 and now it’s coming to PC as well. You can pre-order the Steam version of the game for 10% off from most Green Man Gaming which is set to release on March 28.
“For me, darkness is beauty. How do you balance those two things? That generates an [entirely] new feeling”, Davidsen told NME. “What we’re creating has a lot of volume and language in the garments we’re working with, so in that sense I’m trying to mirror the journey within Diablo as well as my own journey.”
In terms of things you can wear, Davidsen says Han Kjøbenhavn—who sell a ton of everyday gear like sweaters and tshirts, albeit at premium fashion label prices—will be releasing “something which is more everyday wearable” in the near future.
During today’s Pokémon Presents, we finally got a look at the upcoming and highly anticipated Pokémon Sleep app. It was accompanied with an adorable live-action promo and some actual in-game footage.
In the app coming later in 2023, you can check out all the irresistibly cute ways these creatures nap and sleep, and maybe they can help your sleep schedule out a bit too. Described as a “game that makes you look forward to waking up in the morning” (good luck), the game has an isometric perspective, and features many of the familiar faces taking it easy and catching some Zs. Check out all the details here:
As befits a Pokémon game, the title features Professor Neroli, “who’s researching Pokémon sleep.” That sounds like serious, academic business for sure, but it seems rather straightforward in practice. Basically, all you need to do is leave your smartphone within reach of your bed, and the game will measure your sleep. In the video, we got a quick look at how that all works.
Screenshot: Nintendo / Kotaku
If you’ve ever used a sleep app before, this ought to look very familiar. You get a rough average of the overall time you were asleep (and not staring into the blinding light of your phone, doomscrolling on Reddit for six hours…you know who you are), and some fancy stat readouts for various bits of sleep data. From the trailer we can see this includes info like the actual time it took for you to fall asleep.
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Your sleep data gets crunched into one of three sleep types: “Dozing, Snoozing, or Slumbering.” Pokémon whose sleep type matches yours will appear in the game, which is an easy and adorable way to start to get a sense of how well you’re sleeping. And it’s not all boring clinical sleep terms; as we saw in the video today, one unlockable sleep type is “Goofy Sleep” and features a Slowpoke adorably sleeping on its back.
As someone who’s cycled on and off various sleep apps for the past few years and haven’t found one that sticks, this one seems easy enough to understand, and looks fun. Maybe a solid eight hours a night is in my future after all.
Shiny Pokémon are typically just a rare aesthetic anomaly, but one new addition in Pokémon Scarlet and Violet may have some competitive edge if you’re using a shiny variation: Tatsugiri.
The combination dragon- and water-type Pokémon already made a splash in the competitive scene because of its compatibility with Dondozo in double battles. Tatsugiri is able to hop inside Dondozo’s mouth and give it a stat boost. There aren’t a lot of examples of specific Pokémon having contextual interactions with their battle partner, so just as a cool gimmick, Tatsugiri and Dondozo have become a pretty notable competitive team since they debuted in Scarlet and Violet in November. However, Wolfey, one of the top competitive players in the scene, points out that using a shiny Tatsugiri can maybe help you get one over on an opponent.
Tatsugiri has three forms: its curly form, droopy form, and stretchy form. Each form gives Dondozo a different stat boost, and which form you’re using is most readily identifiable by its color. When you have a Shiny Tatsugiri, that makes things a bit trickier, because not only are these different colors than their original, the Shiny droopy form is very close in color to the standard curly form. Wolfey suggests that the closeness in color is in and of itself a deceptive advantage, as the opponent might have a harder time distinguishing one form from the other.
The one glaring flaw in this strategy is that shiny Pokémon have stars that appear around them when they’re sent out to the field, which would signal to an opponent that they’re looking at a shiny variation. This can throw a wrench into the strategy, though these are less noticeable in 2v2 battles where the camera won’t focus on Tatsugiri as it’s sent out. The strategy relies on your opponent’s either ignorance or lack of attention, but it’s still an interesting idea.
Countering Tatsugiri and Dondozo is all about knowing what buff to expect, and to adjust your plan accordingly. If Dondozo gets an attack boost, having a strong physical defender would be ideal. If it gets a defense boost, having a stronger special attacker that can circumvent the increase entirely is the way to go. Dondozo can be a powerhouse with the right composition, but preparing for what Tatsugiri boosts is how you keep it from wiping out your team. A shiny Tatsugiri might not fool every player, but it’s an interesting wrinkle to the Pokémon’s competitive career, which has already been fun to watch unfold since Scarlet and Violet’s launch.
It was almost a year ago that Square Enix released Chrono Cross: The Radical Dreamers Edition, a “remastered” version of the 1999 classic on the PC, Xbox One, PS4 and Switch that, as good as the original game was, was also a very bad port.
Elaborate, pre-rendered backgrounds now look blurry and smeared
3D character models, rendered in higher res, stick out like a sore thumb in the new environments
Combat often stutters and feels unresponsive
There aren’t save states (but there is auto-saving in the overworld)
There’s no option to swap graphical styles on the fly
FMVs haven’t always been upscaled cleanly
The HD fonts are clear but look out of place
See what I mean? A bad port! The game, and fans, deserved better. And better is what they’re about to get, with Square Enix promising an update coming later this month that will try and fix some of the version’s problems. How many of them they’ll fix, and how well they’ll fix them is anyone’s guess, but addressing them is at least a start.
Hello, everyone.
This is the CHRONO CROSS: THE RADICAL DREAMERS EDITION development team.
Following the launch of the game last year, we’re planning to release an update this month.
The update includes a wide range of changes, such as framerate improvements, changes to the growth system for Pip, and fixes for other bugs.
Thank you so much to all of you for your thoughts and feedback on CHRONO CROSS: THE RADICAL DREAMERS EDITION. Have you discovered the secrets that original director Masato Kato added to this remaster?
We hope that you download the update, and that you continue to enjoy playing the game into the future.
Thank you for continuing to support CHRONO CROSS: THE RADICAL DREAMERS EDITION.
After seeing Honkai: Star Rail for a few minutes during a live media preview, I mostly liked what I saw. HoYoverse’s “space fantasy” RPG doesn’t reinvent turn-based combat, but the performance was smooth. The fighting animations were among some of the best I’ve seen out of anime games in recent years. The combat’s turn tracker, team combos, type matchups, and battle animations were reminiscent of games like Shin Megami Tensei and Persona 5. But HoYoverse absolutely does not want you to think of it as either of those games. Besides the seeming identity confusion, my conversation with the developer left me without much optimism about racial inclusion in Star Rail’s space fantasy.
Here’s how Star Rail works: Although you start off with a protagonist character, most of your roster will come out of rolling for wives and husbands through the gacha system. You use them to explore maps filled with enemy encounters (rather than real-time combat like in HoYoverse’s current mainstay Genshin Impact).
Once you run into an enemy, you’ll start a turn-based battle. Each of your four party members will have two skills. Some will be offensive, while others will be support or healing based. Each attack corresponds with an element, and using elemental type matchups effectively will allow you to break shield bars. Once an enemy is vulnerable, you can use team combination attacks to kick them while they’re down.
Screenshot: HoYoverse / Kotaku
Despite the relatively simple combat, the game will feature an auto-battle mechanic. This should make it easier to grind daily battles for resources, which is an essential feature some modern gacha use to keep the games alive.
Star Rail will have a main story campaign and regular sidequests. While it shares similar characters from Honkai Impact 3rd, Fish Ling, a representative from HoYoverse, assured me that there wouldn’t be any story crossover with their incredibly lore-heavy real time action game.
Driving Honkai: Star Rail’s development was HoYoverse’s desire to diversify its portfolio from the usual action games it’s released, according to Michalel Lin, another representative for the developer. Secondly, HoYoverse felt turn-based combat was conducive to “the story that we want to tell.” Its design philosophy was driven by the desire to make turn-based combat approachable for newcomers.
Things got murkier, however, when I tried to ask who the target audience is. The Star Rail presentation mentioned that the game would feature different cultures. Remembering how badly Genshin Impactflubbed depicting darker skinned people and Southwest Asians in the Sumeru update, I asked how the developers intended to improve representation in Star Rail. What lessons did they learn from the overseas community?
“The game is set in a fictional world,” Lin said. “What we do is dependent on how the IP grows. As a combination of cultures in our world, there’s not a specific culture we target. We will continue listening to fans’ feedback, but how the world will be built, we can’t say for certain.”
Screenshot: HoYoverse
It’s 2023, and Asian RPGs keep dropping the ball on diversity. This immensely disappointing answer reminded me of Final Fantasy XVI producer Naoki Yoshida’s response as to whether or not that game would include people of color. Their answer was that their world was fantasy, so it couldn’t be held to any diversity standards at all. Star Rail includes characters who are culturally Chinese, so it feels really shitty that its launch characters seem to be even more light-skinned than those in Genshin Impact. Once again, we have to start holding Asian RPGs to higher standards.
I got similarly vague answers when I asked where Star Rail took its inspiration from. “We think turn based RPGs are very engaging and have an active audience in the market,” Lin said. It took me a couple of minutes to remember that the Persona series has sold 16.8 million units globally and was probably at least one of the games alluded to. When I pressed about the studio’s creative inspiration, Lin told me Star Rail’s team consists of 500 individual developers. Therefore, it would be impossible to narrow down specific influences.
I can guess why HoYoverse is being so coy about its Persona 5 game set in space. It’s likely because the internet tore into Genshin Impact at launch for its similarities to Breath of the Wild, to the point where the developer had to reassure players that the game was more than a clone. But Star Rail will likely release sometime this year, and people will be able to see the Persona DNA embedded in how the game plays.
So here’s the honest summary of Star Rail: It’s a space fantasy game that you’ll probably enjoy if you’re a fan of the Persona or Shin Megami Tensei series. Be careful of the gacha system, and don’t hold your breath over improved diversity from what we’ve seen so far.
Two days ago, Bungie turned off the Destiny 2 servers while the studio looked into a problem that had players apparently losing progress on in-game challenges. This outage lasted a bit longer than everyone expected, with the free-to-play loot shooter remaining offline for nearly 20 hours. So what happened? Today Bungie pulled back the curtain and explained exactly what went wrong and why it had to roll back the game, erasing a few hours of folks’ quest progress in the process.
On January 24 at around 2:00 p.m., Bungie tweeted that it was taking Destiny 2 offline while it investigated an “ongoing issue causing certain Triumphs, Seals, and Catalysts to lose progress for players.” A few hours later, at 5:51 p.m., Bungie tweeted that it had possibly found a fix for the issue and was testing it, but was unable to specify when or if Destiny 2’s servers would come back online. Nearly four hours later, Bungie tweeted for the last time that night, announcing that Destiny 2 would not be playable that evening. Nearly 12 hours later, at around 9:55 a.m, Bungie announced it had finally solved the problem and servers would be coming back online following a hotfix. The nearly 20 hours of downtime had some players worried about the game’s health, and its future. After years of bugs and broken updates, it was really starting to feel like the seven-year-old shooter was being held together with duct tape.
So what happened during those 20 hours and why was the game down for so long, seemingly with little warning? Bungie has explained what broke, why, and how it was fixed in its latest blog post. And surprisingly, the developer is more transparent than you might think, going into technical details of the issue.
According to Bungie, shortly after releasing a previous update for the game (Hotfix 6.3.0.5) players began reporting that many Triumphs, Seals, and catalysts had vanished. Bungie realized that this was being caused after it moved some “currently incompletable” challenges into a different area of the game’s data. To do this, Bungie used a “very powerful” tool that lets the studio tinker with a player’s game state and account. Apparently, due to a configuration error, Bungie accidentally “re-ran an older state migration process” used in a past update. Because of this error, the tool copied old data from this past update into the current version of the game, which basically undid some players’ recent in-game accomplishments
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“Once we identified that the issue resulted in a loss of player state,” wrote Bungie, “we took the game down and rolled back the player database while we investigated how to remove the dangerous change from the build.”
After creating a new patch that removed the mistaken change the issue was fixed, and following some testing, Bugnie deployed the update. However, as a result of this patch, all player accounts had to be rolled back a few hours before the troublesome update went live. This means any player progress made between 8:20 and 11 a.m. on January 24 was lost. Any purchases made during this time got refunded, too.
While it sucks that the game was down for so long and that the team was forced to spend what sounds like many late hours trying to fix their mistake, it’s refreshing to see a developer be so open and honest about what happened and how it was fixed. In a time when games feel buggier than ever and players are fed up with delays, outages, and broken updates, it’s smart to pull back the curtain and show everyone just how hard it is to make, maintain, and sustain video games as complex as Destiny 2.
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